Accommodation levels in Rio de Janeiro are anticipated to be at full occupancy during the conference. While it is not the responsibility of the United Nations to procure accommodation for the media, it should be noted that the Brazilian national organizing committee for Rio+20 has committed to blocking a minimum of 500 hotel rooms in Rio de Janeiro for media covering the conference. Costs must be covered by the media. For more details, visit: http://www.rio20.gov.br For information regarding room availability please contact: Terramar Travel Agency

A Joint Report by UNEP, CSIRO (Australia), TERI, IGES (Japan) and Chinese Academy of Sciences highlights the need and urgency of Transition for Asia-Pacific to a ?Green Economy?

A new ?green? industrial revolution is needed in the Asia-Pacific region that catalyzes dramatic improvements in resource efficiency if the countries and communities there are to prosper in the 21st century. A new report launched by UNEP estimates that per capita resource consumption of ?materials? in the region, such as construction minerals and fuels, needs to be around 80 per cent less than today if sustainable development is to be achieved.

The report, jointly prepared by the UN Environment Program (UNEP), The Energy and Resources Institute (TERI), CSIRO (Australia), IGES (Japan) and Chinese Academy of Sciences, says Asia Pacific?s dynamic growth of the past few decades has reduced poverty and increased wealth and per capita incomes.

Asia Pacific currently accounts for more than half of the world?s total resource use?in large part because it also accounts for over half the world?s population and nearly 30 per cent of the world?s GDP. Without a decoupling of GDP growth from resource use, Asia Pacific is likely to be using 80 billion tonnes materials by 2050.

The report underlines that Asia Pacific has however enormous opportunities to dramatically boost resource efficiency and in doing so boost economic growth, generate new kinds of clean tech industries and reduce, if not overturn, losses linked with environmental degradation.

It calls for a region-wide effort on improved efficiency backed up by smart public policy measures including fiscal policies such as ecological taxes and budget reforms. ?What is required is a new industrial revolution that provides food, housing, mobility, energy and water with only about 20 per cent of the per-capita resource use and emissions found in current systems,? concludes the study.

In the coming decades, the region could be the most important driver of global resource use and related environmental impacts, including resource scarcity, pollution and climate change, unless the patterns of natural resources use are reversed.